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CONCERT REVIEW: Todd Rundgren @ The Tower 11/10
When Todd Rundgren packed the last of his Utopia reunion shows at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby, PA on Saturday night, it was special for several reasons.
CONCERT REVIEW: Todd Rundgren @ The Tower 11/10
When Todd Rundgren packed the last of his Utopia reunion shows at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby, PA on Saturday night, it was special for several reasons. Famously, it was a homecoming for the U-Darb born and raised Rundgren who moved to Downtown Philadelphia with his Woody’s Truck Stop/Nazz bassist Carson Van Osten when Runt was in his late teens. On a hard note, it was a way in which to pay tribute to fallen Utopia member and well-regarded songwriter Mark “Moogy” Klingman. The reason Rundgren reunited with Utopia — his ’70s-started prog-rock band — in the first place was to help the stricken-by-cancer Kingman with funding for his treatments. Sadly, Klingman passed away last Tuesday, just days before Saturday’s show. Still, a long ago-planned ritual by mega-Todd fans quickly became a way to celebrate Klingman and get into the Guinness Book of World Records.
Bill Bricker, a mild-mannered website designer for Capital One by day, is an avid fan of Rundgren who attended his first gig at age 16 in 1974. He has a fan blog, been to scores of shows and wanted to spell out — in neon — how he and others felt about Utopia. So the Charlottesville, Virginia bought over 3,000 glow sticks and handed them out to the assembled mass hoping to spell out the word LOVE at the encore, breaking the current world record of 300 glow sticks. (Bricker’s buddy, Olin Ericksen a Media Relations specialist, sent me this info before the show)
“I wanted to do something special to commemorate the final show of the tour, and a friend suggested a love message in glow sticks for Moogy,” Bricker said, in an email. “With a little quiet advertising on Todd fan pages, I got together with other fans willing to pay $10 each to pay for 100 glow sticks a piece. Very quickly we raised the money needed to provide everyone at the show with glow sticks. We now have 3,000 ready to go. 2,300 are all colors except white distributed randomly as fans enter the area. Then, at a prearranged moment, 700 specially placed white sticks will be illuminated to display the word “LOVE” similar to the famous Love Park Statue. “
With the support of the Rundgren management, Todd and the rest of the band wore the Glow sticks throughout the night, even allowing a fan to put one on Rundgren’s wrist with a kiss of his hand. When Rundgren came back for his encore — “Just One Victory” — he requested that Tower spot lights be turned off so he could view the crowd saying, “Did you make the Guinness Book?” Before getting an answer he said “You will always be in my record book under best audience ever.” During the tune, the stage and the band got bombarded with bracelets. While Guinness analysts are still eyeballing photos for confirmation, Bricker sounds pleased no matter what. “I’m already making plans for the next year in celebration of 40 years of “Something/Anything?”
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